The White House issued a formal veto threat Thursday night of a bill offered by House Republicans that would allow insurance companies to continue offering health plans that existed before the beginning of the new year.

The legislation, sponsored by Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.), is coming up for a vote on Friday.

In a statement from the Office of Management and Budget, the administration argues the law is intended to “sabotage” ObamaCare.

“[The bill] rolls back the progress made by allowing insurers to continue to sell new plans that deploy practices such as not offering coverage for people with pre-existing conditions, charging women more than men, and continuing yearly caps on the amount of care that enrollees receive,” the statement said.

Millions of Americans have received cancellation notices from insurance companies saying that their current plan will no longer be available under ObamaCare. Originally, the law did not permit grandfathering of plans that had been purchased or substantially altered since the health bill was passed three years ago. Some insurance companies also opted to stop offering plans that did not satisfy the minimum coverage requirements mandated for new enrollees under the Affordable Care Act.

I’ve listened to both sides of the argument and remained conflicted until now. Let’s face it – after the last five years or so, the idea of Republicans outmaneuvering Democrats in Washington seemed like a stretch. But by gosh, it looks like their bet that Obama would veto the bill and he and Dems would take all the political damage may have won the day. Millions of Americans are still ObamaCare’s big losers – but so are Barack Obama and his Democrat clown posse in Congress.

And keep in mind…Obama made explicit what his totally bogus, illegal “fix” was all about at his presser when he said, “the Affordable Care Act is not going to be the reason why insurers have to cancel your plans.” He’s trying to shift the blame from ObamaCare onto the insurance companies for the canceled plans. But no one is buying it. NO ONE. Everyone understands that it’s nearly impossible to restore all the canceled policies in the amount of time they have to do it.

The media are not giving him a free pass on this one. Obama’s BS is no longer flying.

EXCERPT“So this Republican measure gets passed by the House, passed by the Senate, signed by the President, heralded by the media as a bipartisan success, and . . .?

And rates continue going up. The insurance companies that play along do so by letting people keep their existing plans at a much higher monthly premium. The public anger about Obamacare grows.

And now the Republican Party owns it too. They, after all, passed the Upton legislation. They, after all, promised the American public that the Upton legislation would allow people to keep their insurance plans.

Congratulations Republicans, you are now, if Upton does pass, co-owners of the rate shock Americans are suffering and your plan, as so many of you privately acknowledge, really does absolutely nothing.

So desperate are Republican leaders to avoid admitting they should have listened to Ted Cruz, they’ll become co-owners of Obamacare rather than fight for full repeal or defunding Obamacare.”

EXCERPT“Insurance companies that have spent three years preparing for the transition to Obamacare will be, with Landrieu, required to let people keep their present insurance.

But the companies will not be required to let people keep those present plans at present rates. Rates are going to skyrocket. People will not be able to afford what was just recently affordable. Further, they will not get subsidies.

So what is more likely to happen?

The Democrats will throw up their hands and say, “By God you Republicans were right. Let’s repeal and replace,” or will they say, “Hey, now we need expanded subsidies and more government control.”

Congratulations Republicans. In passing Fred Upton’s legislation, which the Democrats will counter with the Landrieu plan, the GOP will in one fell swoop be tied to:

Declaring it okay to use mandates;
Massive new increases in healthcare rates;
The reelection of Mary Landrieu; and,
An eventual bipartisan compromise that fixes Obamacare instead of replacing it.

I understand that Republicans are playing a dangerous game. And I have been arguing that they should back away from any “fixes” to ObamaCare and unite behind full repeal. The Democrats want their fingerprints on this thing. But if the president vetoes the bill – Repubs will have their little “messaging” win.

So, when is Dingy Harry gonna stop killing his own party with his obstructionism and allow elected representatives of the people to vote on legislation passed by the House and sent to the Senate?

Never, you say? Why, the Republicans can blast him out of his little duck pond fantasy world for that!

What’s that? They’ve had years of chances to do that and it still hasn’t happened?

Well, maybe that’s because the Republican “leadership” has been told by their Democrap bosses not to make too much noise that makes a lick of sense…

Bottom line is, there’s about a dozen ways the Republicans could hang the whole disaster known as the Obama years on the Democraps and get the LSM to even trumpet every one of them, but they won’t because the Republican “leadership” (along with at least 2/3 of the elected Republicans in Congress) can’t stand the thought of winning and being in the driver’s seat. And I don’t blame them for feeling that, either. After all, look what they did to the country when they DID have control of Congress and the presidency!